Non Trump: Obama on Letterman's pod cast - interesting stuff

[marble falls]

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/barack-obama/obama-innovations-helped-elect-me-now-dividing-country-n836976

Obama: Innovations that helped elect me now dividing the country

by Mike Memoli

WASHINGTON — Former President Barack Obama says the same innovations in technology that helped make his historic election possible have now evolved to exacerbate the nation’s political divides, keeping many Americans inside partisan "bubbles" of their own making.

<snip>

"One of the biggest challenges we have to our democracy is the degree to which we don’t share a common baseline of facts," the 44th president told Letterman for his new Netflix series, "My Next Guest Needs No Introduction."

"What the Russians exploited but it was already here is we are operating in completely different information universes. If you watch Fox News, you are living on a different planet than you are if you listen to NPR," Obama continued.

"That’s what’s happening with these Facebook pages where more and more people are getting their news from. At a certain point you just live in a bubble," he said. "And that’s part of why our politics is so polarized right now. I think it is a solvable problem but it’s one we have to spend a lot of time thinking about."

<snip>

"We essentially built what ended up being the most effective political campaign in modern history. So I had a pretty optimistic feeling about it," he said. "I think that what we missed was the degree to which people who are in power, special interests, foreign governments, etcetera, can in fact manipulate that and propagandize."

<snip>

"When you become president and you’re in the Oval Office you feel, ‘OK, now I have to act presidential.’ And we lost track of what had gotten us there, and that was our ability to tell stories and relate to people," Obama said. "In fairness part of it was, the world economy was collapsing and I had two wars that I had to deal with. So that’ll make you kind of serious."

<snip>

"One of the things that Michelle figured out in some ways faster than I did was, part of your ability to lead the country doesn’t have to do with legislation, it doesn’t have to do with regulations, it has to do with shaping attitudes, shaping culture, increasing awareness," he said. "She’s doing all this cool stuff I’m standing behind a podium and I’m droning on and on about, ‘Well, the legislative strategy for such and such.’ And people are clicking the television trying to find something else."

<snip>

"I think there was a sense I’d run the race, I’d completed it, I was proud of the work that we had done, and that I was ready for the next stage," he said. "The stereotype of former presidents is you’re sitting around your house waiting for someone to call, lonely."

"No, that’s me," Letterman quipped.

"But the truth is it felt exciting," Obama added.

<snip>

"We’re the only advanced democracy that deliberately discourages people from voting," he said. "What ends up happening is we have some of the lowest voting rates of any democracy on earth. The truth is that people opt out themselves because they just don’t think anything can happen."

<snip>

[Hoyt]

1. Watched it last night. Quite good.

[marble falls]

2. I'm going to as soon as I can. Its good to get a little respite from the Orange Shitgibbon.

[Clarity2]

3. I watched it too

I wished it was longer!

Re the housing crisis and what fell into Obama's lap: FDR tried to reduce govt spending when the country seemed to be recovering from the great depression, but it backfired, and led to a recession. It wasn't until he fully expanded govt spending that there was a full recovery. Obama went out there with both barrels loaded - it could have been so much worse. Repukes blame him for deficits, but it would have been a catastrophe without the stimulus, and they would have been fine watching a disaster unfold under Obama. Which makes them all the more repugnant. The way the GOP threw Obama under the bus every step of the way (after so much of the country was energized by his election) and all the propaganda. It's absolutely disgusting & reckless. The GOP has continually proved they put party over the good of the country to get themselves back in power.

[Bayard]

4. Let's say it all together, kids:

GOD, I MISS THAT MAN!!!

[Gabi Hayes]

5. Dems shouldve paid attention to George lakoff, a sort of non fascist version of

Frank luntz, and learned how to market themselves (much as I hate that term, it ‘s just messaging) as well as the KGOP did since luntz and Gingrich figured it out over 25 years ago